Governor's stinging rebuke for Bartlett

The Governor says Mr Bartlett did not have the right to promise power to the Liberal leader.

Patrick Caruana: AAP

In a rare move, Tasmanian Governor Peter Underwood has released his reasons for commissioning Labor to attempt to govern the state, and in doing so delivered a rebuke to the Premier.

Mr Underwood said David Bartlett did not have the right to promise power to Liberal leader Will Hodgman.

Mr Hodgman, meanwhile, says the events of the past few days show that the Liberals were outmanoeuvred by Labor lies.

The Opposition Leader thought he was going to be the next premier but the Governor dashed his hopes yesterday afternoon.

"Mr Hodgman advised me on the 8th of April that he didn't seek the support of the Greens party," Mr Underwood said in his statement.

"My failure to be satisfied that Mr Hodgman had the support of the Labor party not to block supply and not to move a vote of no confidence, except in extreme circumstances, gave rise to a constitutional obligation on the part of the holder of the commission to form government."

This obligation arose regardless of whether Mr Bartlett had the support of the Greens Party or not.

The Liberals are furious because on April Fools' Day the Premier made this promise:

"Labor will only ever move no confidence motions in the most serious circumstances of gross maladministration, of corruption or incompetence or in those circumstances. I mean that's always going to be the case," Mr Bartlett said.

But in a letter to the Governor on Wednesday, Mr Bartlett said he would not make any assurances about no-confidence motions or blocking supply.

Mr Hodgman quickly gave the Governor a copy Mr Bartlett's April Fools' Day press conference.

But in his statement the Governor said he decided to commission Labor because of the Premier's recent letter where Mr Bartlett refused to support the Liberals.

"I considered the material and the contention and concluded that even if I was able to determine from the material given to me that Mr Bartlett has made the commitments Mr Hodgman said he made, his present intention is clearly expressed in the letter set out above," Mr Underwood wrote.

"In these circumstances, I came to the conclusion that Mr Hodgman was not in a position to form a stable government."

Broken promise?

Mr Hodgman says Mr Bartlett has broken his promise in order to hang onto power.

"It was deliberate, not only recanting from his original position, but it did directly leave the Governor, in my view, in a invidious position where Mr Bartlett was saying on one hand I'll pretend to give the Liberals power but I will also threaten to take them down at the first opportunity," he said.

"How can Mr Bartlett seriously say he was giving us an opportunity to test things on the floor of the house? He wasn't even giving us an opportunity to get there."

Mr Bartlett is not responding to the Governor's statement.

Constitutional law expert Michael Stokes says it is rare that the Governor has released his advice, but Mr Stokes says that is because there is usually a majority government.

"I'm not aware of another, similar precedent. This is something which hasn't happened in my lifetime, if you like," he said.

During the election the Liberal and Labor parties had an agreement that if they won the same amount of seats, as they did, whichever party got more votes should form a minority government.

The Liberals got more votes and assumed government was theirs for the taking. But in his statement the Governor said the agreement was irrelevant to his decision.

"The commissioning of a person to form a government is entirely the governor's prerogative and it is not within the gift of any political leader to hand over or cede to another political leader the right to form a government, whatever the result of the election," he wrote.

The Governor has sent Labor back to test their power on the floor of the Parliament.